Australia: News and Views

There is talk that the crazy TSA restictions on liquids will be eased in 2009 Australians, as well as other nationalities who are supposed to have “visa free” access to the US now have to pre-register on a website before flying!   According to the US Embassy in Canberra :

Visa Waiver Program (VWP) enables nationals of certain countries, including Australia, New Zealand, and the U.K., to travel to the United States for tourism or business for stays of 90 days or less without obtaining a visa, if certain requirements are met. Under the VWP, time spent in Canada, Mexico, and adjacent islands counts towards the maximum of 90 days stay allowed under the program. However, all VWP travellers will soon need to register in advance.

OK this is the visas waiver program - why on earth do I have to apply on-line to apply for  that? Isn’t that why we have passpors and security at the airport before I even leave Australia?

If you check out the link -then this requirements goes from the weird to just plain stupid - first you have to enter all the information already encoded on your passport, and transmitted on check-in to US immigration, and then your airline details - also presumably available online. And then you answer the normal silly questions about whether you are carrying sexually transmitted diseases, whether you have ever been arrested (not just convicted, arrested - forget innocent until proven guilty in the land of the free) for “crimes of moral turpitude”

Apparently moral turpitude includes:

Such offenses generally involve conduct which is inherently base, vile, or depraved and contrary to the accepted rules of morality and the duties owed to persons or society in general

Ooops does skipping church for 20 years count? What about living in sin with my partner? Are you sure these aren’t the entry rules for Iran or Saudi Arabia?

The thing that really annoys me though is the arrogant assumption that Canada, Mexico and “adjacent islands”, whatever they might be (Russia? Cuba?) are somehow under the US immigration control. If you want to transit LA on the way to a 6-month stay on a valid visa in Canada - you are not eligible - even though you  may only be in the airport for a few hours and ever other country in the world would give you a transit visa.

The following is circulating - not sure if was written by an American:

Dear World:
We, the United States of America, your top quality supplier of the
ideals of liberty and democracy, would like to apologize for our 2001-2008
interruption in service. The technical fault that led to this eight-year
service outage has been located, and the software responsible was
replaced November 4. Early tests of the newly installed program indicate that we are now operating correctly, and we expect it to be fully functional on January 20. We apologize for any inconvenience caused by the outage. We look forward to resuming full service and hope to improve in years to come. We thank you for your patience and understanding.
Sincerely,
THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA

one just hopes that it actually turns out to be true.

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